# AgentFM: Role-Aware Failure Management for Distributed Databases with LLM-Driven Multi-Agents

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.06614 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.06614/

## Key facts

- Cited by 19 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Software engineering coding agents, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use.
- Builds on 9 of its 30 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 9 Apr 2025.

## Placed in

- LLM agents and tool use / [Software engineering coding agents](https://mlsanity.com/agents/software-engineering-coding-agents/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 9 of 9)

- [Root Cause Analysis In Microservice Using Neural Granger Causal Discovery](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.01140/) (2024)
- [Automated Root Causing of Cloud Incidents using In-Context Learning with GPT-4](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.13810/) (2024)
- [mABC: multi-Agent Blockchain-Inspired Collaboration for root cause analysis in micro-services architecture](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2404.12135/) (2024)
- [Robust Failure Diagnosis of Microservice System through Multimodal Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.10512/) (2023)
- [X-lifecycle Learning for Cloud Incident Management using LLMs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2404.03662/) (2024)
- [Multivariate Log-based Anomaly Detection for Distributed Database](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.07976/) (2024)
- [Heterogeneous Anomaly Detection for Software Systems via Semi-supervised Cross-modal Attention](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.06914/) (2023)
- [Reducing Events to Augment Log-based Anomaly Detection Models: An Empirical Study](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.04834/) (2024)
- [Twin Graph-based Anomaly Detection via Attentive Multi-Modal Learning for Microservice System](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.04701/) (2023)

## Built on by (most cited first, 19 of 19)

- [KVCOMM: Online Cross-context KV-cache Communication for Efficient LLM-based Multi-agent Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.12872/) (2025)
- [A Survey of Reasoning and Agentic Systems in Time Series with Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.11575/) (2025)
- [A Survey of AIOps in the Era of Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.12472/) (2025)
- [Adaptive Root Cause Localization for Microservice Systems with Multi-Agent Recursion-of-Thought](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.20370/) (2025)
- [Towards Transparent and Incentive-Compatible Collaboration in Decentralized LLM Multi-Agent Systems: A Blockchain-Driven Approach](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.16736/) (2025)
- [MicroRemed: Benchmarking LLMs in Microservices Remediation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.01166/) (2025)
- [Agentic Memory Enhanced Recursive Reasoning for Root Cause Localization in Microservices](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.02732/) (2026)
- [Hypothesize-Then-Verify: Speculative Root Cause Analysis for Microservices with Pathwise Parallelism](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.02736/) (2026)
- [LogAction: Consistent Cross-system Anomaly Detection through Logs via Active Domain Adaptation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.03288/) (2025)
- [From Feedback Loops to Policy Updates: Reinforcement Fine-Tuning for LLM-Based Alpha Factor Discovery](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.15412/) (2026)
- [RuntimeSlicer: Towards Generalizable Unified Runtime State Representation for Failure Management](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.21495/) (2026)
- [A Survey on AgentOps: Categorization, Challenges, and Future Directions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.02121/) (2025)
- [E2E-REME: Towards End-to-End Microservices Auto-Remediation via Experience-Simulation Reinforcement Fine-Tuning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.11094/) (2026)
- [Towards Robust LLM Post-Training: Automatic Failure Management for Reinforcement Fine-Tuning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.04431/) (2026)
- [When Planning Fails Despite Correct Execution: On Epistemic Calibration for LLM-Based Multi-Agent Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.23414/) (2026)
- [Towards In-Depth Root Cause Localization for Microservices with Multi-Agent Recursion-of-Thought](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.14866/) (2026)
- [LLM Agents for Time-Series: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.26226/) (2026)
- [Agent System Operations: Categorization, Challenges, and Future Directions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.01581/) (2026)
- [Playing social deduction games with reinforcement fine-tuned large language models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2610.04261/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Distributed databases are critical infrastructures for today's large-scale software systems, making effective failure management essential to ensure software availability. However, existing approaches often overlook the role distinctions within distributed databases and rely on small-scale models with limited generalization capabilities. In this paper, we conduct a preliminary empirical study to emphasize the unique significance of different roles. Building on this insight, we propose AgentFM, a role-aware failure management framework for distributed databases powered by LLM-driven multi-agents. AgentFM addresses failure management by considering system roles, data roles, and task roles, with a meta-agent orchestrating these components. Preliminary evaluations using Apache IoTDB demonstrate the effectiveness of AgentFM and open new directions for further research.